Director, Payroll Applications & TechnologyPay Rate: $95–$100/hour
Location: Culver City, CA
W-2 assignment budgeted through 3/26/2027
About the CompanyA leading global entertainment and media organization with operations spanning film, television, content production, distribution, and digital entertainment. The organization operates a complex, large-scale environment supporting diverse employee populations and business operations across North America.
Position OverviewWe are seeking an experienced Director, Payroll Applications & Technology to lead the strategy, reliability, modernization, and support of the technology ecosystem supporting North American payroll.
This position combines strategic technology leadership with hands-on payroll systems expertise. The Director will own the technical roadmap for payroll and workforce management applications, lead technical teams and vendor partners, oversee complex implementations and enhancements, and provide senior-level leadership during critical payroll production issues.
The ideal candidate brings extensive experience with enterprise payroll and workforce management systems, strong knowledge of end-to-end payroll processes, and the technical depth to troubleshoot complex application, integration, data, and configuration issues.
Key Responsibilities- Own the technology strategy, technical health, operating model, and multiyear roadmap for payroll and workforce management applications, including Infor WFM and UKG Payroll.
- Lead modernization initiatives focused on improving system reliability, automation, scalability, controls, analytics, and the overall payroll user experience.
- Establish and maintain technical standards across system configuration, integrations, reporting, automation, security, and controls.
- Oversee integrations and data flows between payroll systems and enterprise platforms including Workday, SAP Finance, banking, tax, and time & attendance systems.
- Provide senior technical leadership for complex payroll production issues involving applications, integrations, calculations, timekeeping, access, data, and financial postings.
- Lead root-cause analysis and permanent resolution of critical incidents through data analysis, configuration and log reviews, interface tracing, testing, and business validation.
- Ensure temporary workarounds are controlled and replaced with sustainable long-term solutions.
- Provide leadership during critical payroll cycles, system releases, implementations, cutovers, go-lives, and stabilization periods.
- Lead, mentor, and develop payroll technology resources while establishing strong standards around ownership, responsiveness, documentation, and technical rigor.
- Build internal capabilities through coaching, cross-training, support playbooks, diagnostic standards, knowledge management, and succession planning.
- Manage technology vendors, contractors, managed service providers, budgets, contracts, statements of work, service levels, and overall vendor performance.
- Partner closely with Payroll Operations, HR Technology, Finance, Information Security, Audit, integration teams, and other key stakeholders.
- Provide clear executive-level communication regarding system health, incidents, priorities, project progress, risks, dependencies, and required decisions.
- Maintain current technical documentation, testing evidence, change controls, runbooks, support procedures, and audit-ready materials.
- Ensure payroll technology solutions comply with payroll and tax requirements, collective bargaining agreements, SOX, information security, data privacy, and audit controls.
Qualifications- 10+ years of progressive experience in payroll systems, HRIS, workforce management, payroll technology, or related enterprise applications.
- Demonstrated experience leading business-critical payroll technology environments and technical teams.
- Hands-on experience configuring, administering, implementing, or troubleshooting enterprise payroll or workforce management platforms.
- Strong understanding of end-to-end payroll
Please submit your resume in Word or PDF format to be considered.
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